


Three Moments Between Joyce Summers and Rupert Giles

by Roca



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-12-18
Updated: 2014-12-18
Packaged: 2018-03-02 03:15:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2797535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roca/pseuds/Roca
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After cursed candy and runaway daughters and more than a little heartbreak, they've never quite figured out how to act around each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BlessedLunatic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlessedLunatic/gifts).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set between Season Two and Season Three.

Joyce had not ever really thought about tea before. She’d visited Liverpool for a few weeks in college, and had been perplexed by the sheer amount of the stuff that the people there drank. They even had an entire meal set aside for the consumption of it. It had been bizarre, but she hadn’t minded it too much – she’d usually just stack the fun little sugar cubes into pyramids and – immature twenty-year-old that she was at the time – crunch them up without even bothering to make a pot of tea at all.

But, decades later, when she found her hands full of teabags once more (as well as a battered old tin of the loose leaves that she had dug out of the back of her cupboard), she felt just as young and foolish as she had been when she’d been roaming Europe. But she’d been carefree and full of life then, and now… Now she was tired and beaten down and faintly ashamed.

She quickly rapped on the door in front of her and waited impatiently for it to open. As soon as it did, she took a deep breath and thrust the contents of her arms at the surprised man in front of her. “These are for you,” she told him. He stared at the jumble of tea-making things in his hands for a moment, and then nodded graciously and stepped aside so that she could come in. He didn’t ask what had prompted this sudden gift – he could recognize a peace offering when he saw one.

Joyce had been planning to just drop off the tea and go, and hesitated before stepping into his small apartment. She wasn’t really certain what the polite thing was to say to somebody that you’d yelled at for being the cause of your daughter’s disappearance little more than a week ago. But, as nice as ancient and musty bags of various assorted herbs were, she felt that she owed him more.

Mr. Giles escorted her to his couch, and then immediately went to put the kettle on. He then came back to the living room – though he pulled a chair over from the kitchen instead of plopping down beside her. A short and awkward silence ensued.

“Would you like some orange pekoe?” He said at last, and started to pick through the offering she had made. “Or perhaps some…” He stopped and frowned at the one of the labels. “…Some, erm, ‘Exotic Monkeyflower Brew’?”

“What?” Joyce was startled out of her discomfort. “Give me that!” She leaned over and took a look at the tea in question, and then laughed. “My God, it really is! I can’t imagine where I picked that up from.”

“We could give it a try, if you’d like,” Mr. Giles said, and she saw that he was also grinning. “The water’s just about ready,” he added as the teapot let out a shrill whistle.

“Sure,” Joyce replied, and then let out another giggle. She immediately quieted, suddenly acutely embarrassed. Why on earth was she twittering like a little a little girl, especially in the home of Mr. Giles, who she had been so rude to before?

But she then realized that she didn’t really care. After a long, tense summer full of doubt and anxiety, it felt good to just throw caution and rules and out the window and laugh.

Mr. Giles returned with the teapot a few moments later. He also toted two teacups and had retained his smile. And it never faded as they dunked the teabags, sipped the tea (it was actually quite good), and made several primate-related jokes about its flavor.

And so an afternoon that had initially promised to be full of uncomfortable apologies and stuttered conversations quickly dissolved into one of strange teas, laughter, and, after a few hours of the first two, genuine friendship.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set during "Darla."

Joyce Summers was exhausted – both from the pain and the painkillers – so she was not entirely sure that she was seeing correctly when Buffy’s librarian appeared once again in the doorway of her hospital room.

  She’d dozed off for a little while after he’d left for the second time, and she really hadn’t expected him to return – it was far past midnight, after all, and he should have been at home and asleep by now. Instead, he was perched in the doorway, a shy and tentative smile on his lips that failed to mask the genuine concern in his gaze.

 “Mr. Giles?” she rasped, blinking to clear her drug-clouded vision. When she had determined that he was, in fact, actually there, she followed up with an awkwardly blunt, “What are you doing here?” that had her mentally kicking herself.

 “I just came to, to see if you were still doing all right,” the librarian explained, drawing back a bit and suddenly seeming a bit uncertain. “I didn’t mean to intrude-”

 “No,” she assured him quickly, “I didn’t mean it like that.” When she saw that he still looked hesitant, she added, “You’re welcome to come in.”

 Mr. Giles offered her a grateful smile, and then cautiously entered the bland little room and took a seat in a chair near her bedside.

 Joyce found herself strangely glad to have him there. Company, she supposed, was company – even if said company was her daughter’s odd librarian. She could’ve done worse, though. The man, form what she had seen from his interactions with Buffy, was gentle, soft-spoken, and genuinely pleasant. Those were traits that all too few people possessed these days.

 As soon as Mr. Giles had settled down, she asked, “So, is Buffy’s friend okay?” She flashed him a sheepish grin. “I hope that I didn’t scare her too badly.

                The man appeared startled for a moment, but swiftly recovered. “Darla? Yes, she’s been…” a mysteriously amused look spread across his features, “... taken care of.”

 Joyce was confused by his attitude, but she was too tired to really think about it too much. “That’s good,” she said instead. “Thanks for that.” Long sentences were becoming a bit tough to string together as the fatigue set in in earnest, but she gave him a grateful smile to make up for it.

 “It was no trouble at all,” he told her kindly, and she vaguely reflected about how nice his voice sounded. The accent made his words lilt and had a lulling quality, and she felt herself drifting off to sleep despite herself.

 “That’s good,” she repeated, her voice slurring a bit. “No trouble’s… good.”

 She thought she heard a soft chuckle, and then a murmured, “Perhaps it’s best that you get some rest now, Mrs. Summers.”

 The suggestion was greatly welcomed, but she was suddenly struck by a niggling doubt. As Mr. Giles rose to leave, she lifted one of her hands and caught ahold of his sleeve. “Mr. Giles?” she asked, and her tone, though bleary, was firm. “Look after Buffy, okay?”

 She was fairly certain that librarians were not exactly the kind of people one usually asked to take care of their child, but there was something reassuring about this man – and in her half-lucid state, she could think of no one better to turn to.

 Mr. Giles paused for a moment. Then, very slowly and deliberately, he told her, “I will.” There was a multitude of emotions in his voice as he said it, and, through the two simple words, he managed to convey them all: solemnity, pride, determination, affection, and perhaps a bit of sadness.

They lingered in the air as she allowed her hand to fall limp and sleep to overtake her, and they tainted her dreams with bittersweet promise as Mr. Giles silently left the room.


End file.
